Chip Edgar

Charles Francis "Chip" Edgar III (born August 8, 1964) is an American Anglican bishop. He has been bishop of the Anglican Diocese of South Carolina (ADOSC) since 2022.

Early life, marriage and family

Edgar was born in 1964 to Charles F. Edgar Jr. and Virginia Edgar and raised in Huntsville, Alabama. He attended Westminster Christian Academy, which his parents cofounded and on whose board his father served. The academy was affiliated with present-day Westminster Presbyterian Church, which later joined the Presbyterian Church in America. In 1973, the board of the academy voted to admit black students for the first time.

Edgar attended Wheaton College from 1982 to 1986, majoring in physical education and winning a conference title in the 200 yard Butterfly as a significant member of the Varsity Swim Team. From 1987 to 1992, Edgar served in campus ministry roles with the Coalition for Christian Outreach at Grove City College and as a residence director at Wheaton. On September 2, 1989, he married Beth Anne Marcinko. They have two sons and three daughters, the youngest two of whom were adopted. From 2001 to 2003, Edgar was elected to the Bishop and Trustees of the Episcopal Diocese of Chicago, the body that oversees the diocese's real property.

During Edgar's tenure as rector and dean, Church of the Apostles commissioned church planters or church revitalizers in Bellevue, Washington; Woodstock, Georgia; Houston, Texas; Wilmore, Kentucky; Lynn Haven, Florida; and Lexington, South Carolina. He was consecrated by the Most Rev. Foley Beach on March 2, 2022, at the Cathedral Church of St. Luke and St. Paul. Edgar stated that his goal would be to accelerate church planting in the diocese, especially in the metro Charleston area, which has seen substantial population growth.

Outcome of litigation

Edgar's first year as bishop was dominated by the denouement of the long-running legal battle between the ADOSC and the Episcopal Diocese of South Carolina over properties valued at $500 million. In April 2022, the South Carolina Supreme Court issued a decision awarding 14 of the ADOSC's 29 contested parish properties to the EDOSC. Clarifying a lower court ruling that in turn interpreted an earlier Supreme Court decision in the matter, the Supreme Court determined that the 14 parishes did indeed create an “irrevocable trust in favor of the National Church and its diocese” by in some form adopting the Episcopal Church's 1979 Dennis Canon.

Several of the parishes requested a rehearing, arguing that, based on the court's criteria, they had not placed their property in trust (or had revoked the trust pursuant to South Carolina law) for the benefit of the Episcopal Church and its associated diocese. In August 2022, the court granted the petitions of six of the parishes, leaving just eight parish properties set to be returned to EDOSC. (In October 2022, without a critical mass of Episcopalians to restart a congregation, the EDOSC agreed to sell St. Matthew's, Fort Motte, to the ADOSC congregation. )

Edgar and EDOSC Bishop Ruth Woodliff-Stanley, who had been consecrated in 2021, began mediation to discuss a resolution to the disputes between the dioceses in spring 2022. On September 26, 2022, Edgar and Woodliff-Stanley jointly announced a settlement between the dioceses. While the settlement did not affect remaining issues regarding the property rights of three parishes still pending before the state Supreme Court or a betterments lawsuit by several parishes pending in state trial court, "it does resolve all remaining issues regarding diocesan properties." As part of the settlement, St. Christopher Camp and Conference Center on Seabrook Island was transferred from the ADOSC to the EDOSC on October 1, 2022.

Both the ADOSC and the EDOSC agreed to provide quitclaim deeds to ADOSC church plants whose properties were not subject to orders in the litigation. They also agreed to dismiss pending litigation in federal court over diocesan names and seals, leaving the EDOSC as the owner of the historical name and seal. “This settlement agreement allows us to invest our diocesan energy, time, focus, and resources in gospel ministry rather than litigation," Edgar commented. "While the losses we have experienced, including those of St. Christopher and several of our parish buildings are painful, I am grateful that the work we have done has brought an end to litigation between our dioceses."

In October 2025, The Washington Post reported the allegations against Wood, who said through the ACNA provincial office that the complainants had first gone to media instead of pursuing the church's official mechanisms for reported misconduct. Edgar, who had known about the allegations since 2024, responded that this claim was untrue. The presentment, filed by 10 clergy and lay people, was reviewed by a panel that recommended Wood be tried on the charges in a church court.